Under the Dome: "Heads Will Role" Review

If the Dome's a-rockin...

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June 30, 2014

"The dome's trying to tell us something!"

"That's ridiculous!"

Oh, Under the Dome. Don't ever change.

Which is to say that's it's no more ridiculous that the dome is trying to communicate with people inside of it than it is for there to be a town trapped inside a giant, supernatural dome in the first place. So any character who arbitrarily dismisses anything, any theory, comes off like a goof.

"Heads Will Roll" had a few things going for it. It had a ton of big action set pieces involving metal getting sucked violently into the side of the dome, and it killed off a cast member or two (neither of them Junior though? Really?) Granted, Linda and Angie (if she's really dead) won't be missed, but their exits still represent the series trying its best to raise the stakes. Much like the series premiere itself last summer, this was a big episode with most likely a larger production budget than some of the other episodes that followed.

The funny thing is that there was probably a time when I would have been sad that Linda died. For a while there, in Season 1, she was one of the only few likable characters. Then they turned her into an easily-duped fool who made bad choices and, well, she became just like everyone else. Still, right before she died she as able to realize the mistakes she'd made with regards to Big Jim and Barbie. But it was "too little, too late" as she was almost immediately crushed by a truck.

And how did she manage to change her mind regarding Big Jim? Barbie finally said, out loud, that Jim killed Dodee. That's right. He decided it was time to tell someone with words from his mouth. Something he could have, should have, said during the past two episodes of last season, but never did. All he ever managed to blurt out were things like "You're making a mistake." Even when they were about to hang him, he said nothing.

So it was sort of painfully obvious that the first few minutes of this episode were an attempt to very quickly un-do a lot of the thick-headedness that dragged Season 1 down so drastically. Both Linda and Junior, right out of the gate, were able to see that Big Jim was a murdering creep. Of course, that also made this the fourth or fifth time that Junior's flipped sides. And none of it stopped Big Jim from still being in charge of everyone at the end (Don't Junior and Barbie still know what he did? And wouldn't one of them want to tell Phil?).

This picture will never be not funny.

Suffice it to say, there are still a ton of things terribly wrong with this show. First and foremost: the dialogue. "What the hell are you supposed to be? The Ghost of Christmas Future?" Big Jim screamed at a dome-created vision of Linda. Guys, that's awful. And it's a sign - or yet another sign - that Stephen King can't write dialogue for the screen (he wrote this episode).

Oh, and I haven't even mentioned that big Jim got trapped in his own bunker. Because we haven't quite had our fill of people being locked up in that damn thing. While inside, he was confronted by the ghost of Dodee, who started putting the whole "you need to kill yourself" bug in his head, that Linda would later echo. Making him think that he needed to hang himself in order to somehow save Junior. But if you're to believe the whole "dome message" thing, the lesson was for Big Jim to first want to kill himself - but then have someone else spare his life. Which means that he had to be back at the hanging station for any of this to matter. Or else he could have just taken a gun and shot himself and the dome's overly convoluted BS plan would have never been completed.

Of course, the dome even having a master plan at all comes from "monarch" Julia. She thinks that her sparing Jim's life is what stopped the crisis. But, guys. It could have also been - *drumroll* - science! That's right, there's a faith vs. science love triangle starting up! Between Julia, Barbie, and the latest hot teacher in town, Rebecca. And the first time Julia and Rebecca lock eyes (with Barbie in the middle) they already go at it. With Rebecca believing that it was her science that stopped the dome and Julia certain that it was because she followed the divine instructions. Oh, and don't think that Julia also won't get pulled away romantically. Uncle Sam's in town (having hidden out in a cabin the entire first season) and he's got eyes for her. In fact, right after Barbie was in between Julia and Rebecca, Julia was standing in between Barbie and Sam.

On the bad dialogue front, I don't think anything made me cringe more that Sam saying, having just met Julia, "Some things you never get over. Like my sister taking her life nine years ago." And the best part of that horrible line was that Julia barely even noticed it because the dome immediately pulsed and she ran to the window to check it out. Hilarious.

The teens, who are normally a huge pain in the ass, spent most of the episode dodging debris. So they didn't have much time to hit us with their usual nuggets of idiocy. And yes, I very much enjoyed the nail being ripped through Joe's hand. And if that end scene, with the swinging axe and splatter of blood, was meant to be Angie's end, I very much enjoyed that too. Though her placing that perfect bloody hand print on the locker didn't look or feel natural at all. Unless that was the other girl's hand. The girl from the lake. Either way, it looked hammy. Maybe it's the color of the blood. Because earlier, when ghost-Dodee put her finger in her bullet hole and then held up a bloody finger, that didn't quite look right either.

I think my new favorite bad thing on the show now though is Rebecca. The science gal. With her note pad that she's always scribbling on. Calculations, you see! She's calculated this and that! And she knows how to stop the dome's vengeful magnetism.

CUT TO: The completion of a giant magnet.

Because Barbie, who's still public enemy number one, was able to convince a bunch of citizens to come together for a big, physical project involving wires and heights. I think they even put that thing together faster than they did the gallows in the town square.

And yes, because I think the things I think, Rebecca almost instantly reminded me of David Hyde Pierce's character in Wet Hot American Summer. Tinkering with his beeping doodad to calculate the trajectory of falling satellite debris. The main differences being, naturally, that Rebecca's gorgeous and Wet Hot American Summer is an irreverent comedy. Still, she's doing the same thing here that he did there.

The Verdict

By killing off two (or more) characters in the premiere, "Under the Dome" is definitely going for a new "no one is safe" vibe. Though it would help of any of the characters who were no longer safe were characters I actually care about. Plus, the dome can make anyone pop back up as a ghost-type thing so no one really leaves. And since everyone's so flat, it doesn't actually matter if we're seeing them "alive" or "dead."